UK chancellor Rachel Reeves on Wednesday announced funding for 11 green hydrogen projects, in the first Labour budget in 14 years.

“Today, I am providing funding for 11 new green hydrogen projects across England, Scotland and Wales,” Reeves said. “They will be amongst the first commercial-scale projects anywhere in the world.”

These projects were selected for a total funding of £2 billion ($2.6 billion) under the first Hydrogen Allocation Round (HAR1). Although the winners were announced last December, no contracts have been signed yet, leaving the hydrogen developers in uncertainty. 

“The government will provide support for the first round of electrolytic hydrogen production contracts, harnessing renewable energy to decarbonise industry across the length and breadth of the UK,” says the autumn budget document seen by Kallanish.

Yet, details on when the contracts could be signed were not provided. 

Reeves also confirmed £125 million for Great British Energy, which will be headquartered in Aberdeen. In addition, the chancellor confirmed £3.9 billion of funding in 2025 and 2026 for the first carbon capture and storage (CCUS) clusters in the UK.

“There was comparatively little new on energy expenditure too as most of the government's major commitments (funding for Great British Energy, carbon capture and storage, etc.) had already been announced some time ago,” comments Jeremy Nicholson, corporate affairs officer at Trio. “Nevertheless, it is worth noting the announcement of new funding for eleven green hydrogen projects, which are likely to be the first of their kind in the world.”

Meanwhile, the government has announced over £200m in investments in 2025-26 to “accelerate EV chargepoint rollout,” including funding to support local authorities to install on-street chargepoints across England. The budget has also earmarked £120m to support the purchase of new electric vans through the plug-in vehicle grant, as well as to support the manufacture of wheelchair accessible EVs.